Subtext Projects
Fort Worth, TX
2010

Three Propositions and a Musical Scenario was a pop up one-night exhibition organized by Noah Simblist and Subtext Projects in Fort Worth, Texas.
Initially conceived as an after-party for the Liam Gillick exhibition opening that same night at Fort Worth Contemporary Arts, this event riffed on Gillick’s historical relationship to Relational Aesthetics and emphasized the ephemeral and performative.

Three Propositions and a Musical Scenario was located at an artist studio complex. Three small storefront spaces showcased one-person, site-specific installations by Justin Boyd, Brad Tucker and M. including video, sound, drawing and sculpture. In addition to this, a pavilion in the parking lot served as a stage for performances by Jenn Gooch and Richie Budd. All of these artists shared a history of engaging in art and performance.
In the storefronts:

Justin Boyd, who has performed turntable improvisations about the Mississippi River, brought field recordings and ephemera from the safe, stable setting of his home in San Antonio to this cold, industrial, transient space in Fort Worth. Brad Tucker, who has performed songs based on lyrics by the conceptual artist Allen Ruppersberg, with a band of video images of himself, included a video performance that exploited the correspondence of the two-hour duration of this event and a VHS tape. While M, a member of Denton’s notorious Good/Bad Art Collective and a member of the critically acclaimed art-electronica band Mission Giant, created an installation including a wall drawing and boombox reminiscent of the 1980s rappers The Fat Boys in one of the storefront spaces; he performed backup for Richie Budd.

In the pavilion:

Jenn Gooch, an artist whose work often deals with our attempts and inabilities to connect with others, played a 1927 tenor banjo named Vernon. Richie Budd, whose installation at Artpace entitled Absorbing Liminal Homeostasis overwhelmed viewers with sensory experience, deconstructed this piece to produce an electronic music performance entitled Personal Victories featuring Richie Budd.
Ft. Worth’s own Tacos La Piedad was also on site!

Bios:

JUSTIN BOYD received his BFA from The University of Texas at San Antonio and his MFA at The California Institute of the Arts. He has exhibited in several solo shows, including his recent I drove the Mother Road Home at Art Palace and Justin Boyd & Nick Tosches (both in Austin); and numerous group exhibitions, including Lonely are the Brave at Blue Star Contemporary Art Center in San Antonio. Boyd was also a 2007 finalist for the prestigious Arthouse Texas Prize. He is currently working on a solo exhibition of text-based work for The Southwest School of Arts and Crafts in San Antonio. Boyd teaches full time in the New Media Department at the University of Texas at San Antonio.

RICHIE BUDD, an internationally exhibited multi-media artist, has an MFA from the University of Texas in San Antonio and a BFA from the University of North Texas. Budd’s recent exhibitions include Architectonic at the Contemporary Art Dealers of Dallas; Absorbing Liminal Homeostasis, as an artist-in-residence at Artpace San Antonio; Remarks on Color, at Galerie Baer, Dresden, Germany; and Material Culture, curated by Frances Colpitt, Fort Worth Contemporary Arts, Fort Worth. Budd is currently an artist-in-residence at Centraltrak, the University of Texas at Dallas. He lives and works in Fort Worth, Texas.

JENN GOOCH is a multi-media artist and musician. Her songwriting reveals her past: awkward religious imagery and musical influence related in a rich East Texas drawl, intermittently gentle, spirited, and sometimes evangelical. Gooch’s lyrics conjure the voices of writers like Faulker and Flannery O’Conner, while her banjo lends her vocals a sparse warmth that is enduringly plucky and awkward. Jenn Gooch self-released her debut album, Gift Horse, in October 2008. Additionally Gooch has collaborated with George Neal and played with his band, The Slow Burners (Denton). She currently lives and plays the banjo in Denton, Texas.

M received his BFA from the University of North Texas in 2000. A former member of Denton’s Good/Bad Collective, M. has had solo exhibitions at Road Agent Gallery and at the Good/Bad Art Collective. M. has been in numerous group exhibitions, including Various Small Fires, Road Agent, Dallas; Sound + Vision. Crooked Space, Denton; 2001 hip, “still going” NRH Gallery, North Richland Hills;The Trouble with Feelings. Good/Bad Art Collective, Denton; Fourth Anniversary Show. Angstrom Gallery, Dallas; Hi-Jinx. Arlington Museum of Art, Arlington, in conjunction with the University of Texas at Dallas Visual Arts Building, Dallas. M. currently lives and works in Fort Worth, Texas.

BRAD TUCKER received his MFA from Bard College and BFA from the University of North Texas. Tucker has exhibited at P.S.1 Contemporary Art Center, The Dallas Museum of Art the Houston Museum of Fine Art Arthouse in Austin Inman Gallery in Houston, Lombard-Freid Fine Arts in New York, Ibid Projects in London, Sala Diaz in San Antonio the Suburban in Chicago and Mark Moore Gallery in Los Angeles. He has also given numerous multi-media performances in conjunction with exhibitions at the Dallas Museum of Art, the 2007 Texas Biennial, Bard College, Fort Worth Contemporary Arts, Blue Star Contemporary Art Center in San Antonio, Art Palace in Austin, and Arthouse in Austin. He currently lives and works in Austin, Texas.